Ever wanted to create Shared Tasks/ToDo Lists … ?

Just discovered what could be a really neat Web 2.0 app. Remember the Milk allows you to have an active ToDo list that you can easily share and what’s more impressive you can add tasks by Twitter, from a Google Gadget, from an email and a number of other possibilities.

It’s also mobile so if you have an iPhone or iPod Touch there’s a connector and from the BlackBerry just connect to m.rememberthemilk.com

I found it as a result of wondering how to keep a track of domestic tasks which then have to be shared with Jenny and tracked through to completion. Now the easy bit has been finding some neat technology – the more difficult step will be the socio-cultural change … now where have I heard that phrase before.

RTM allows you to share tasks or lists with another registered user (so Jenny’s already got an account – she doesn’t know that); it can mail out; it can also receive tweets assigning a task using “@twittername task” to another RTM registered user . I’m just dying to set up the tasks now … there’s still very little chance of them getting done, but my anxiety level will go down as I won’t forget what it was that I had good intentions to do.

Watch this space

Am I sad, or is this important

Yesterday I spent probably 30mins thinking about the best way of putting really useful text into the displayed message of my availability for corporate IM. No point being funny! You then have to change it regularly, or it loses its impact. Must have information content – “I am in the office” is hardly breath-taking news. Should be useful and give direction of what the best way of communicating with me might be.

We now have presence awareness related to our corporate eMail system and this applies to our Contact (Buddy) Lists as well, so I can see what all my colleagues are up to, and they me! So Presence Awareness Messages such as … “I am busy so please eMail me” are informative and give an indication of how best I would like someone to contact me. “I’m away from my desk at the moment, why don’t you tweet me” – (apart from confusing 95% of my colleagues) would also be appropriate advice -if only I could persuade them to use Tweet as a message sent that way can be relayed on to my mobile via SMS without me having to give out that number. Finally “I’m available to chat” is the virtual “open door policy” that is much advocated for managers – I can still quickly respond, “just a moment”, or “give us a call”, or “meet me in the tea room in 2”.